Pipeline to avoid Krishna holy sites
Pittsburgh Post-Gazette
WHEELING, W.Va. — The local Hare Krishna community has reached an out-of-court agreement with Rover Pipeline LLP that allows the company to proceed with its pipeline but on an altered route that avoids sacred Krishna temples and holy sites.
The pipeline rerouting was agreed to Thursday after a brief hearing before U.S. District Judge John Preston Bailey, who urged the two sides to negotiate, then called a recess to give them time to do so.
Forty-five minutes later, Rover’s attorneys and Krishna community leaders and their attorneys returned to court to announce the settlement. The Hare Krishna community had challenged Rover's eminent domain action that would have routed the pipeline along hills near two sacrosanct temples and through properties that are essential to the practice of their religion.
“I am pleased they were able to adjust the route to accommodate our two sacred places,” said Jaya Krishna, president of ISKCON — the International Society for Krishna Consciousness, which owns about 1,700 acres outside Moundsville, W.Va.
The new pipeline route through the Krishna properties will use about 3.5 acres for a right-of-way 50 feet wide and 5,300 feet long.
“They moved. They were able to get the pipeline off of the
hill and moved it away from the original farm area, which is a sacred place,” said Gabriel Fried, an executive agent and board member in the Krishna community. “We appreciate the company’s respect for our religious beliefs and we are grateful to the judge for giving us the time to negotiate.”
Bill Wilmoth, a Rover attorney with Steptoe & Johnson in Wheeling, said Rover was glad to reach an agreement on rerouting the pipeline. “Rover takes religious freedom very seriously and tries its best to protect sites that are sacred to any religion,” he said.
Rover, a subsidiary of Energy Transfer Partners, which was the focus of recent protests by the Standing Rock Sioux tribe over the route of its Dakota Access Pipeline project in North Dakota, will need to get approval for the rerouted pipeline from the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission. Thomas Zabel, a Houston, Texas-based attorney representing Rover, said that won’t be a problem because both sides have agreed to the change.
In addition to rerouting the pipeline, the settlement calls for the Krishnas to cut down trees along the new route before March 31, when tree cutting must end to protect endangered bat and migratory bird populations in the wooded hills around the Krishna temples and holy sites.
When completed, the Rover Pipeline will carry shale gas 713 miles from from three Appalachian states — Pennsylvania, West Virginia and Ohio — into Michigan and Ontario, Canada.